Force of nature one thing farmers can count on

Folks, most North Queensland farmers would be able to tell you, using fairly graphic language, why Nature is called a "mother”.

After years of drought and spending a fortune buying feed for their livestock, the dust-caked cattle farmers must have thought they'd finally caught a break when the rain started to tumble down last month. Sadly, it didn't tumble, it plummeted.

I imagine there must have been quite a lot of cow cockies going into shock as they uttered the words they never thought would pass their lips, "I wish the flamin' rain would go away.”

For the past fortnight they watched the torrents fall and their land disappear under water, along with all their hard work and animals.

As the first images of drowned cattle popped up on the news last week they didn't really capture the full horror of the unfolding cow catastrophe. Millions of acres of farming land had been transformed into a sodden, bovine graveyard as 300,000 to half a million cattle made their way to Livestock Heaven.

The full effects of the cow-mageddon haven't sunk in yet for most Australians, but it will when they see how much a steak dinner is going to cost in the very near future. If anyone is teetering on the edge of becoming a vegetarian, I'd say now would be the perfect time to pick up your salad tongs and give it a whirl.

Because, I'm no farmer (for which I should get on my knees and thank my lucky stars) but I'm guessing we're looking at possibly five to seven years to replace those losses, and that's only if conditions are perfect; which they seldom are.

For the poor farmers trying to get hay to their stranded, starving and bewildered survivors this disaster could actually be the last straw.

Meanwhile as they struggle on, and the feral pigs and dogs prepare to enjoy the picnic of a lifetime, Ma Nature has slipped another card from the bottom of her weather deck in the form of a soul-sucking heatwave.